Yes, there is typically a physical machine (or a cluster of physical machines) behind a cloud database like MySQL. Cloud databases are built on top of underlying hardware infrastructure, which includes servers, storage devices, and networking components. The cloud provider manages this infrastructure, abstracting it from users to offer scalability, reliability, and maintenance-free operations.
For example, when you deploy a MySQL database on a cloud platform, the provider allocates virtualized resources (like CPU, RAM, and storage) on their physical servers. These resources are pooled and dynamically assigned to meet your database's performance needs.
In Tencent Cloud, you can use TencentDB for MySQL, which is a fully managed database service. It runs on Tencent Cloud's high-performance physical infrastructure, offering automatic backups, failover, and scaling capabilities. This ensures your MySQL database is both secure and efficient without requiring you to manage the underlying hardware.